The Golf Blog says: It’s been a while since Rory McIlroy was ranked World No. 1. In that time, we have seen some of his impressive weight lifting regimen. As Brandel Chamblee and others have questioned, we wonder if all this weight lifting and bulking up has helped or hurt Rory’s golf.

You don’t see Tom Brady, perhaps the best QB ever, getting too muscular. Instead, Brady does high intensity interval training. Brady maintains his flexibility and strength to throw pinpoint passes. In fact, his trainer Alex Guerrero “had to get Tom Brady to stop lifting so many weights. He would find Tom trying to beat everyone else into the weight room in the morning. Now, they focus on pliability and range of motion, rather than brute strength. When you’re constantly lifting weights, Guerrero says your tendons get smaller and more contracted. This hurts an NFL quarterback’s ability to throw the football like he wants to.” Gotta wonder if similar principles apply to golfers, who historically were not even in the weight room like football players. Rory looks like he has bulked up and is in great shape. But how much of the weight lifting is helping his golf game?

For example, Rory ranks 100th in strokes gained putting in the PGA Tour this year. There’s probably little, if any, help weightlifting can offer to improving one’s putting. And all the time bulking up takes away at least some time one could spend on the putting green.